Photographer to shoot 50 weddings in one day with his iPhone

After a long career in photography and editing, Kevin Kuster found new inspiration in mobile photography. Despite his new assignment to shoot 50 weddings in a day, Kuster is not usually a wedding photographer. Most of his work is commercial or editorial.

Kevin Kuster is a veteran photographer — he has been taking photos for over 20 years and spent 18 years with Playboy magazine, leaving as its Senior Photo Editor. When he was first exposed to the concept of mobile photography, he wasn’t convinced.

“At first, I didn’t get it,” Kuster told Connect. “I thought it was silly. I was a professional snob – I looked down on it.”

After watching a few instructional videos, Kuster decided to buy an iPhone 4S and has been hooked on shooting with his smartphone ever since. The longtime career photographer says that his iPhone has reinvigorated his passion for photography.

Kuster, who lives in Chicago, was recently approached by the charity Watts of Love to help with an interesting photography project that seemed a perfect opportunity to make use of his newfound love of mobile photography.

Watts of Love raises money to send solar-powered lighting to remote locations around the world. By providing people with safe and sustainable lighting, Watts of Love hopes to reduce the number of deaths caused by dangerous kerosene lamps and boost local economies by enabling children to advance in their studies through being able to do schoolwork at night.

Kuster explained his interest in Watts of Love: “Photographers are all about using light and these people don’t have light.”

Kuster's current portrait subjects tend to be gruff American types. His upcoming trip to the Philippines will give him a chance to capture an entirely different culture.

Watts of Love’s first mission is to the island of Ilin in the Philippines. On top of lacking a reliable, sustainable source of light for the majority of its inhabitants, the remote island has not had a pastor or priest visit the island in quite some time. As a result, there are at least 50 couples that are waiting to tie the knot.

Watts of Love's partner, Missionaries of Mother Mary of the Poor, asked a pastor to come to the region to preach and perform the ceremonies.

When Kuster discovered that his visit coincided with an upcoming visit from the pastor, he couldn’t turn down the idea of shooting the event. But instead of just photographing the service for Watts of Love, Kuster wanted to give the couples something to hold on to.

“Most of these people have never owned a photo of themselves,” Kuster said. “This will be an amazing wedding gift.”

Kuster will be taking portraits with his iPhone, printing the photos from a Canon Pixma mobile printer and placing them in acrylic frames.

When asked why he will be using his iPhone instead of one of his DSLRs, Kuster explained that a large DSLR camera can build a barrier between the subject and photographer.

“(Subjects) let more personality come out in front of an iPhone,” Kuster said. “Instead of staring into a DSLR lens, they can look at my face. I feel like it’s more personal.”

At recent photo shoot of Civil War reinactors, Kuster primarily used his DSLR but also took some shots with his iPhone just for kicks. At a photo conference, he showed an audience the DSLR/iPhone photos side by side and they overwhelmingly preferred the iPhone images.

According to Kuster, this DSLR photo doesn't reveal as much of the subject's personality as the iPhone portrait (left).

Kuster believes that iPhone photography allows portrait subjects to let their guard down becuase they are not looking at an intimidating DSLR.

"It’s never about the quality/grain structure," Kuster explained. "Technical was out of the way, it was about the aesthetic."

Kuster leaves on Februrary 8th and will try to update his Instagram (@kevinkuster) throughout the trip. Those interested in donating to Watts of Love can do so here: $10 buys a solar-powered light for a person in the dark.

We will be talking to Kevin Kuster again after he returns from the Philippines and can’t wait to hear about his 50-wedding iPhone photo shoot.

Comments

I am a wedding photographer in Cheshire, UK where the weather is often bad. I would not like to photograph a wedding with a phone unless the lighting (and therefore lighting) was perfect. I have taken some greta photos on my phone - but not in low light conditions!

Hope you have a chance to read the second article and see this project is about helping people not specifically about the camera used. The islanders are more concerned with eating everyday and surviving then anything to do with legal action.

People, we can kick and scream, but it is coming. Soon the few of us with true love for photography will stand in a small group, just like the people who love film photography stand today. Cameras will never go away, but will become the quarky, cumbersome instrument that only a few with deeper knowledge will understand. The new generation does not care too much about quality of anything and so things will change.

The only conclusion i get from this is that he is lousy on post-processing and lazy because he relies on pre-made effects from iPhones.And the "intimidating DSLR" is so relative... When people see a DSLR, some even pose. If it was a iPhone they would look at you with a "what a joke" expression.

Yea just like back in the day when we used to pick a film to suit our shoot. Maybe Velvia for super saturated colors or your favorite B&W film for portraits. Choosing pre-made effects in Camera isn't much different. As far as quality how is this much different than the people who shoot some pretty amazing work with Holga's ?

That dSLR vs iPhone comparison is the epitome of manipulation. Unless you were standing right there, you did not see how he set up each photo and you did not see how the subject was to have allegedly relaxed when the intimidating dSLR was suddenly removed from the space inches from his face.

It's all a big joke, as is the constant flood of "me too" iphone photograph articles.

But what else does the mobile photography web site have to do with its time ...

Don't know what all the fuss is about. Mobile photography has been around for years. My DSLR is mobile, compact cameras are mobile, phones with cameras are mobile.

It would take courage if the photographer was not a big name photographer, was not published and was trying to make a business out of wedding photography.

Its all about using the right tools for the job. Nothing wrong with using a phone if thats what you decide is the right tool for the job. I am pretty sure that 99.9% of wedding photographers wouldnt take the chance of using a mobile phone as their only tool to photograph a wedding, which just about says it all I think.

One of the all-time greats of photography, Andre Kertesz, used to have to lie to editors about his camera. If he told them he used a Leica, they would not give him work. So he would print at home and then bring the prints in. They couldn't tell the difference. Cartier-Bresson even remarked "Kertesz taught us how to see." Just goes to show what great work must have been lost over the years because of prejudice, ignorance and convention.

As a D800 user professionally, I do love boat loads of data. But I also love my point & shoot and my iPhone when the Nikon is just too big and bulky to pull out and get a quick shot of the 13 week old grand baby.

As for ignorance and prejudice, I see the anti-Apple contingent just can't seem to pass on an opportunity to vent their spleens.

It takes courage to do what Kevin is doing, as it does for every other serious mobile photographer. Being an early adopter of anything is fraught with judgment and misunderstanding. i respect what Kevin is doing and am inspired by him.

BTW, all the photos in the Time Magazine issue about Hurricane Sandy, inclujding the cover, was shot by photojournalists who used iPhones (or maybe other mobile cameras) exclusively. That should tell you something about the validity of mobile photography!

My son turned me on to the iPhoneography in November2011. I got one for a trip to Europe and took it along with my Lumix LX5, andthe only camera I used was my iPhone. I felt like I did when I first entered art school to learn photography (SFAI), totally engrossed with image making as if for the first time!

I have had discussions (polite term) with photographers who just don't get it about mobile photography and the sea change it represents with theffiled of photograpjhy. I read most of the disparaging comments here about Kevin's project as feeling threatened or jealous or both.

"Kuster believes that iPhone photography allows portrait subjects to let their guard down becuase they are not looking at an intimidating DSLR."

Gahhhhhhhhh that scary DSLR is stealing your soulllll

Oh please, those two shots of the guy are totally different, and personality? The SLR photo is a slice of himself in 'character' in his setting, the second is plain snapshot, he's concious of the camera and looking right at. The post process on the SLR shot is much more pleasing as well.

And "instead of looking at the lens they can look at my face"Well pal guess you haven't heard about Live View, it's the same function!!

Full res the iphone is blurry grainy and dead flat, the other shot has depth and detail that's so beautiful, I want a print of that! The iphone shot looks good on an iphone and left at it's tiny size... as much as I say resolution doesn't matter, IQ and resolution has a minimum standard...

You know what WOULD be interesting? If Playboy hired him to shoot an entire issue wit only an iPhone. EVERY nude photoshoot, EVERY celebrity interview, EVERY political news story, EVERY advertisement. Shot with an iPhone.

I'm not a DSLR snob, but the right tool for the right job. There is nothing wrong with using a smartphone to capture the world. In fact in certain circumstances a smartphone may capture a better picture.

As far as the intimidation factor of a DSLR vs a smartphone, I don't buy it.

I'm a professional photographer. I use an iPhone sometimes. Not for work.

I don't pull out my iPhone when shooting a wedding. Because if I'm messing with my iPhone trying to pull up the right app, tapping to focus, trying to get the exposure right by eliminating bright or dark spots from the compositions you know what I'm doing? MISSING IMPORTANT SHOTS.

The intimidation factor is just an excuse. If you can develop a rapport with your subject then you should be able to use just about anything to get a good photo of them.

"According to Kuster, this DSLR photo doesn't reveal as much of the subject's personality as the iPhone portrait (left)." You know what the real problem with that photo is? Bad use of a wide-angle for a portrait.

Every other "article" is a "pro photog uses iPhone to shoot (insert subject here)". There's gotta be SOMETHING else to write about...

Than the article is an outright blatant lie for you just informed us ( jcmarfilph) .......it was a mass shot of 50 couples all at once............... This is just the kind of info-mercial we can come to expect of a company who uses slave labor and false advertising to push their over-rated cheap chinese products on us. So apple will NOT shoot 50 weddings in one day then...... they will shoot 50 couples all at once in a mass wedding group photo session which will last aprox. 30 seconds to one minute. Thanks for clearing that up. Funny how plain , mundane and trivial it is now eh. So this was all spin doctored as I expected. That's more what we expected from apple a $20,000,00 spin on the title of an article to drum up interest on a $5 chinese produced piece of .C**P

Ah, so the secrets out! And here I was doing the simple math to see how he could possibly do 50 weddings in one day, even if that was over the full 24 hours. Silly me, it was an Apple stunt. Should have realised earlier.

Okay, so tell me one phone that is morally or ethically, or economically superior to the iPhone.

You can't because of all the tech companies out there, only Apple is doing something about worker conditions. All the rest of the manufacturers are cowering in the dark, hoping people don't notice they aren't doing what Apple is doing to stop worker abuse in their supply chains. Apple even recently fired one of their major manufacturers for not following their guidelines.

Alas, some people's lack of regard for the truth is seriously crippled by blind hatred. Not to mention an astoundingly poor discernment of quality manufacturing.

I was not paid by Apple or Watts of Love for any of my involvement. If you know of any corporate sponsors or individuals that want to help spread solar lights to people in desperate need me please contact me or Watts of Love anytime. We would love to have any assistance possible. Thanks in advance.

As far as I am concerned you can use whichever camera you wish so long as it gets the job done. However to say that the iPhone image reveals more than the DLSR photo above is a bit rich especially when they are completely two different images . The DSLR image for a start is taken from the side and doesn't show the subjects eyes.

Can I just say that most of you here are acting like "bullies"!!! Do you even know Kevin? He is a man with a good heart and all he wants to do is bless these couples with a photo of their wedding day. Stop being so defensive about your dslr's. What are you going to do when he gets back and his photos (from the wedding AND his travels) are awesome!!! Where is your professionalism? Aren't most of you professional photographers...is there no camaraderie between your profession? No I am not a professional photographer but I am an encourager.....thank you for your time and may God Bless you all!

i think the majority of the skeptics here would have been silenced if Kelvin decides to take the Nokia 808 to the project . Reality is there is nothing spectacular about IPhone camera, hence the vast attempt to make it as anything more that what it is...a common mobile cam, is just the Emperor's new clothes.

With the myriad of awesome PnS in the market (Lumix LX5/LX7, Sony RX100, Canon S110, Fuji X10, Olympus XZ2, Pentax Q, etc) and all with their custom presets to choose from, there is no real excuse to bring a phone to shoot a wedding if portability is the thing.

Lighten up people! It's about the response (or lack of response) to a mobile phone taking photos, which can lead to a far more natural result. Posed photos may be technically good, but if they fail to capture the feeling of the moment, what's the point.

It's something like the observer effect in an experiment, when the observer changes what is observed. Mobiles simply have a lighter and less intimidating effect. Couple that with the near-ubiquity of DSLRs these days and you can see why pros are trying something different. And yes, the iPhone is a 'good camera', as I am sure other mobiles these days are. The softwear is a big part of this, no doubt about it, but wasn't how film got developed relevant, too?

I had family shoot with 2 D70 bodies when we were married in 2007. The money that would have gone to hiring a pro went into 2 lenses and a flash unit. We didn't get every shot a good pro might have, but we don't have an expensive horror story out of it either. I wouldn't pay someone to spend a few minutes with an iPhone at a wedding regardless of their talent.

Really ......... must be real "in depth professional photo sessions" ......even at 8 hours straight shooting , No Stopping, No resting, no meals, no washroom breaks ,,.......that be ummm 6.25 weddings per hour, or 9 minutes per session. I'll call B.S. on that one

Than the article is an outright blatant lie for you just informed us it was a mass shot of 50 couples all at once............... This is just the kind of info-mercial we can come to expect of a company who uses slave labor and false advertising to push their over-rated cheap chinese products on us

Camera snobs will be camera snobs. Lighten up, people! Why do so many get bent out of shape about using an iPhone? "Oh, my DSLR this and my DSLR that... megapixels, super sharp, so cool with my big rig..." Get bent.

The difference between those two civil war shots, besides them being completely different shots, is this.

The one on the left looks as if I could find it in a history book describing the life of a civil war soldier during that time. So a serious, real life setting where he seems to be pondering something. It makes me question what that is.

The one on the right looks funny. As if I used a time machine to go back to the civil war and showed up right next to this guy, and his reaction is confused as well as "you better not move or I'll shoot you". It looks a little more fake when he's looking right at the camera, not more personal.

No problem with this. Just tell the bride to walk 1mph on the aisle and put halogen lamp on the church to avoid noisy, blurred or out of focus shots. Tell them to pose for 15 secs each shot (lets see if they will be not distracted with the horrible sluggishness of iPhone). And oh, add 10 point USM t before you upload the picture so it will look sharp at 640x480 resolution.

I don't wonna say mobile is the same or better than dslr. Everything evolves. Mobile photography has become a widespread and relevant medium, cool and more accessible than a dslr. It's only another tool... The the key point is that a photographer like Kevin is embarking on an adventure worthy of respect and admiration. You are a great person, Kevin! Safe travels, have a good timeand enjoy it... I can't wait to see your awesome shots from this amazing adventure.

If he wants to reduce the barrier between himself and his subjects, then why not use one of the excellent new, and small, compact cameras, that at least shoots raw? None of the professional photographers I know would even dream of not shooting raw. Sounds like both a gimmick, and publicity event yet again for Apple - funny how it's always an i-Phone!!!!

When I got married 12-odd years ago we couldn't afford a professional, someone took photos with a disposable camera & scanned the photos at like 640x480. All of the photos, like 75 of them, could fit on a floppy disk. I owned a Nikon EM & FE, lenses and hot shoe flashes, but no one knew how to work them (remember, these were 70s-era SLRs with manual-focus etc).

I now own a Nikon D5100 with 18-105mm VR & 50mm 1.8G, Olympus E-PM1 with kit lens and my wife has a Canon Digital Rebel XS that cost all of $175 including the 18-55mm, bag & a tripod. That equipment, had it existed then, probably would've cost in the tens of thousands of dollars.

Even my wife's XS, which is the absolute "beater" of this group, would've been wonderful to have had back then. I could've put it in FULL AUTO mode and handed it to somebody & even though the photos still wouldn't been professional, they'd sure been much better.

I sure don't sit around thinking "man, if only iPhones had existed back then."

Maybe this all seems silly and absurd now...but I remember using record players to play records and cassettes in my Walkman to listen to music. I couldn't have thought back then that we would someday use iPods and iPhones and pandora and spotify for music. I think as skeptical as we can tend to be, we need to remember that just because someone tries something new or pushes the boundaries of where we currently "are"...it doesn't make it inherently wrong. I use both dslr's and my iphone and I love them both. But it doesnt lesson my creativity or abilities when I use my iphone! Keep pushing Kevin. I am excited to see what you come up with!

Amen! And it goes way beyond the record/walkman/ipod experience. Technology, creativity--art! have been evolving for quite some time despite the naysayers thankfully. These so-called 'professionals' on this forum come off very unprofessional with their closed minds. Their very own creativity has been polluted by the urge to please the client at all costs. Let people pursue their creativity however they wish. If you don't like mobile photography then don't pay any attention but spewing your venom on a forum makes you sound trollish and hateful. I am willing to bet anything that the same haters that are hating on iPhoneagraphy (bet u all hate that word) were hating digital cameras because it was never going to be like film!

There is nothing wrong with change, but change should always aim for the better. This is only aiming for the worse in every possible way.

It's all just a publicity stunt to get some attention from fanboys of Apple gear. News sites jumps over this because this as it instantly gives them lots of hits and traffic to their sites, although as the comments seen here it's hardly positive feedback for them.

Kim,It's unfortunate that the good work/intentions of the Missionaries are buried under the technobabble. But then again, this forum is with dpreview, not with UTNE.I personally am judgemental because unless the Connect article is skipping some specifics as to funding and who gets what, this event reeks of grandstanding and commercialism. It's like a Western company gives the island population $5,000: a huge fortune over there for medicine and infrastructure. Great! The problem comes when the the rights to these photos generate ten times or more for the "sponsor". Huge problem as far as copyrights issues and fair play.

Wow, some of these comments are just flat out ignorant. Why the need to be so judgmental? The focus should not be on the photo equipment. Watts of Love (a charity) approached Kevin and he agreed to take time away from his family, his business, his life, to fly halfway around the planet so that he could help to change the lives of other people. People who don't have any electricity, no light after dark, and after Kevin's visit they will have a source of light. They don't have any photographs at all, and after this they will have one. A physical memory to look back on years from now, show their children, grandchildren, etc, something they never had before. Try to just put that into perspective for a second.... I think it's a beautiful thing that Kevin and this organization are doing.

No one is saying that mobile is the same or better than dslr. The fact is that mobile photography has become a relevant medium, and many people find it fun and more accessible than a dslr. I think too many people are trying to turn this into something it's not.

You are a great person, Kevin! Safe travels, and I can't wait to see the photos from this amazing experience. XO

Here are some ideas: for a fraction of the cost of flying in Mr. Kuster, hire a local photographer... there's a whole bunch of talented people in the area.auction the idea to Samsung, Nokia, Blackberry, Apple for donations/funding/sponsorship/goodwill for cold hard cash. Winners gets to have their phone used.bind Mr. Kuster to a contract that any profits from books and spin-offs go back to the models, the people on the island. For all the good intentions the participants may have (or lack), my perception is that this is more, and I can't get the phrase in my head, like Western voyeurism of the poor, and this is not unique in the history of photography.

I wonder. Are the children of those 50 couples going to ask this in the future "Dad did you not have any decent cameras in you days ? And why do you look like you lived under dim lighting. Mom you skin is so rough it looks like it needed sand papering , you also look very old for your age . " I could go on and on.

You can take a high quality original and and turn it into a carppy time zoned / grained / aged / grainy / saturated picture , but you can't revers the process.

How many people out here wished they had the digital tech we have today out there when they had major events like getting married. It would be great as you can change the feel of those pictures if you wanted to ,as to the current tastes of the day. But you need to start with a good true original. Watch the movies they never clone the fat ugly guy.

The photographer will obviously have a back up shooter with a proper camera.

If a so called 'professional photographer' came to my wedding with a bloody iPhone only i would kick his ass then sue him for not delivering the highquality work i demand from a professional on such a important day.